EXCLUSIVE: Taylour Paige (Zola) has signed on to star alongside Vito Schnabel in The Trainer, the upcoming dark comedy, which Tony Kaye (American History X) is directing from a script by Schnabel and Jeff Solomon.
13.03.2022 - 20:27 / variety.com
Dennis Harvey Film CriticWhen “The Blair Witch Project” got the found-footage horror subgenre properly started in 1999, it was already asking for trouble that the protagonists were film students pointing their cameras where they shouldn’t. These days, prospective victims in such movies are likely to make us feel they deserve their fate by being professional self-promoters with such widely despised job titles as “influencer,” “YouTube personality” or “reality TV star.” Sharp objects may also be involved, but in horror cinema, few things prove more reliably fatal than narcissism.So we know the goose of bearded thirtysomething Shawn Ruddy (Joseph Winter) is cooked right away in “Deadstream,” because he’s introduced in a bombastic montage of clips from the streaming series of which he’s the star and entire crew.
He self-identifies as “the world’s biggest wuss — facing my fears one dumb-ass challenge at a time.” The latest such fear: a solo overnight stay at “the most haunted house in the United States.” One can safely guess that this “Wrath of Shawn” episode will probably be his last. A feature debut for married multihyphenates Vanessa and Joseph Winter following several shorts, “Deadstream” is a fun comedy-horror ride both driven and limited by the noxious onscreen character of its co-director/writer/producer/editor.
Neither he nor the movie want for invention or energy. At the same time, both basically hit one manic note for an hour and a half that might have been reduced to punchier effect.
Nonetheless, this official opener to SXSW’s Midnighter section is a cut above most indie exercises of its type — comedic or straight-faced — and should do well with genre fans as a streaming item. Shudder picked up rights for North
.EXCLUSIVE: Taylour Paige (Zola) has signed on to star alongside Vito Schnabel in The Trainer, the upcoming dark comedy, which Tony Kaye (American History X) is directing from a script by Schnabel and Jeff Solomon.
Variety reported.TickPick also said that from Sunday night through Monday the company sold more tickets to the comedian’s tour than they did all of the past month.Rock will make stops in major cities across the US, including New York, Chicago and Las Vegas.
Will Smith smacking Chris Rock onstage at the Oscars packed a new punch into the complicated history of “insult comedy.”The “King Richard” actor stormed onstage during Sunday’s live broadcast and walloped Rock across the face before returning to his front-row seat and yelling a profanity-filled threat at the comedian. Rock was accosted after making a joke about Smith’s wife, calling Jade Pinkett Smith “G.I. Jane” in reference to her bald head, which she has previously explained is due to the medical condition alopecia.
Five months after the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during the production of Rust, the film’s star Alec Baldwin is set to make his screen comeback in a pair of Italian Christmas features.
EXCLUSIVE: Reid Miller (Joe Bell), Jonathan Silverman (Good Girls), Marguerite Moreau (Wet Hot American Summer) and Chris Mulkey (Twin Peaks) have signed on to star in the indie Feeling Randy, marking the solo directorial debut of veteran cinematographer Dean Lent.
EXCLUSIVE: Tom Blyth (Billy the Kid), Chris Diamantopolous (Red Notice), Jordyn Denning (Pam & Tommy), Zach Villa (Good Mourning with a U) and Jay Mohr (The Cleaning Lady) have signed on to star in the comedy Discussion Materials, marking the feature directorial debut of TV writer, director and producer Alfredo Barrios Jr.
EXCLUSIVE: Vito Schnabel (Before Night Falls), Julia Fox (Uncut Gems) and Steven Van Zandt (The Sopranos) have signed on to star in the dark comedy The Trainer, which Tony Kaye (American History X) is directing from a script by Schnabel and Jeff Solomon.
Kelly Ripa is celebrating one of the best performances in cinema this year at the upcoming Live with Kelly and Ryan After Oscar Show. The talk show host, 51, transformed into Tammy Faye Bakker, played by Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain, 44, in the The Eyes of Tammy Faye, in a clip from the show that airs March 28, the day after the 2022 Academy Awards. Kelly absolutely nails her impersonation as Tammy by rocking the iconic evangelist’s signature red curly hair, eye lashes, and makeup. The clip even starts off with Kelly belting out Tammy’s anthem “Jesus Keeps Takin’ Me Higher and Higher.”
Thomas Markle has blasted daughter Meghan Markle and her husband Prince Harry, calling him “her ginger husband”.
Steven Gaydos Executive VP of ContentThe Critics Choice Assn. has selected Billy Crystal to receive this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s ceremony on March 13.A Billy Crystal life achievement reel might look a lot like a history of American showbiz.
Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic“Silence. Darkness.” Those two words appear up front in most of Neil Labute’s stageplays, though his latest feature, “House of Darkness,” opens with a more playful “Once Upon a Time …” The film — Labute’s first in a bumpy seven-year stretch since “Dirty Weekend,” during which the provocateur was abruptly dropped by longtime Off Broadway partner MCC Theater — starts out as a standard hookup scenario and twists into edgier, potentially supernatural “Promising Young Woman” territory.